Since becoming a gardener, I have been lucky to have experienced many gardens and met so many inspirational gardeners… I have been inspired by petite pocket gardens in urban areas; potted vertical gardens – flowers and herbs spewing from pots precariously attached to the walls of houses in ancient cities, gardens which dangle off cliffs in the High Atlas region of Morocco; Tomatoes growing atop the Acropolis; as well as luxuriously endowed and staffed gardens.

I think of the times when I have been away for 3 months and return to thigh high vegetation growing in our gravel drive – as nature pushes back and weed seeds have blown in… it has taught me that gardens are precious, without a gardener to maintain the vision and nurture it, they can so easily revert to wild. And, that I need to purchase a machete the next time I’m away for an extended period!

What matters… is that these exterior visions are fragile and important to our culture as art and architecture of the times. They need to be respected and saved.

Plan to vist a garden – one can always learn something, or at least breathe some fresh air, but more importantly experience the gardener’s work in progress… their vision… their need to plant, sustain and enjoy nature. The fragility of these visions… which creates a memorable sense of place and balance.

My wise friend Hilda always cautions with a kind voice, “Be careful what you wish for…”
Like most things in life, an action causes a ripple not to be reversed.

Native Americans honored the spider long before Charlotte’s Web was penned or became a delightful film with the memorable, sound of Julia Robert’s soothing voice. I’m certain a whole generation of children left their screens in search of a Charlotte of their own, heading outside to explore!

“So it was that Spider wove the first primordial alphabet, as she had woven the dream of the world that had become manifest. Spider’s dream of the physical world had comer to fruition millions of years before.”

“Spider’s body is made like the number eight, cons of two lobe-like parts connected at the waist, and eight legs. Spider is the symbol for the infinite possibilities of creation. Her eight legs represent the four winds of change and the four directions on the medicine wheel.”

“If Spider has dropped from her web into your cards today,” (I prefer getting into nature and then looking up the animals/insects I encounter), “she may be telling you to create, create, create!” … from Medicine Cards by Jamie Sams & David Carson

One of them was a gem of a garden… the gentle breezes, the blowing table cloths,

Secret nooks captured views… the knowledge that someone envisioned a plot of land and worked it for their delight and fascination…

Meet Frank Harmon…

His fascination with design, building, art, everything green is astounding! It is comforting that he pulls along the roadside to do a quick watercolor of Native Places weaving a sense of time, sense of place and the importance of honoring these Native Places… then shares them.

With all that is happening in the world, I wish more people spent time seeking time to reflect and think in a garden.

Time yields perspective – thank you Frank for this lovely piece…

NATIVE PLACES A COLLECTION OF THOUGHTS AND IMAGES BY FRANK HARMON

Gardening with Others

There’s been quite a ruckus in our town this summer about building a modern house in a historic garden district. Someone who lives across the street from the modern house sued the architect. The neighborhood is divided, pro and con, and nerves are getting pretty jangled, causing one opponent to say, “If this house is built, it will be the end of the Christmas Candlelight Tour!”

It’s time to sit in a garden.

A garden such as this one in Charlotte, North Carolina, planted by Elizabeth Lawrence over half a century ago. Lawrence grew several hundred plant species in a space about the size of a tennis court. She loved plants but her floral diversity was criticized. “I cannot bear for people to say (as they often do) that I am better at plant material than design. I cannot help it if I have to use my own well-designed garden as a laboratory, thereby ruining it as a garden,” she wrote. Yet visitors come from around the world to admire her garden.

Elizabeth Lawrence could have arranged her garden with plants that looked like her neighbors’. Instead, she spread a mosaic of flowers.

Fall 2008 – My friend Beth and I sat in the Harmon driveway, greeting guests for the Garden Conservancy Open Days Tour – taking tickets, answering questions and simply enjoying the discoveries in this magical setting. By the day’s end, I sat in every place provided for lingering – to capture a better understanding of the effortless design, to breathe it all in – beauty and peace – to capture a memory.

Judy Harmon, ASLA (RIP) – a landscape architect, had lovingly designed and planted this garden. For Judy, it was her and husband Frank’s private space – integrating interiors with exterior living. The swaths of plants on a tiny lot – sensitively complementing and enhancing the lines of husband Frank Harmon’s (an amazing architect, teacher and green advocate) contemporary design for their modern home.

The Modern dwelling, provided an integrated backdrop – contemporary softened by visual living movement – of light and color and water. Punctuated along paths by simple visual shapes for contemplation.

Frank Lloyd Wright’s designs were shocking at one time, yet with time, revered for his ideas, scale and functionality.

Over time, his designs are now historic pillars of architecture.

New subdivisions of faux period bungalows today flourish and beckon to a safer time – before cul-de-sac s, and soccer moms, when kids walked to school and played in the streets… times when Moms’ spent more time in their homes that in their SUV’s waiting in lines for school or Chick fil-A orders!

I love contemporary design as well historic design. There is is place in time for each.

With open minds, a respect for the new and the old to live together – to balance each other.

Every fall as Solidago rugosa ‘Fireworks‘ – golden rod – bloom, catching and swaying in the breeze… I think of that glorious day in Judy’s Garden. Old fashion golden rod bred for a shorter explosive stature, cleverly punctuated – with the yellow of other flowers and furniture and repetition of Yucca filamentosa ‘Bright Edge’ – grouped in clusters of fives giving structure and a modern edge. Greens contrasting the strong Red of the contemporary dwelling… with exciting complementary scheme and the yellow marrying it all together in soft drifts of movement and color.

It is brilliant, old and new, yet fresh and fluid as the pressed linens in the breeze.

While asking Frank if it was OK to feature his charming watercolor painting of Elizabeth Lawrence border, (stop back tomorrow), I spoke of my sweet friend Judy, his wife and partner and her garden.

Frank wrote, ” The Garden looks as fresh and vibrant today as it did in 2008.”

He was touched and knew Judy would be smiling her sweet impish smile of approval… to be remembered and to once again be sharing her garden.